A recently published article in the Journal of Urology highlights how effective Stockholm3 is at improving the diagnosis of prostate cancer. The clinical study used the diverse US SEPTA cohort and showed that Stockholm3 performs better than common biomarkers and risk calculators.
“The original results from the SEPTA study showed that almost half of unnecessary biopsies could be avoided with Stockholm3 compared with PSA, with equivalent performance across different ethnic groups. The new study shows that the results are similar even when additional biomarkers, such as the ratio of free to total PSA, are used,” says lead author Scott Eggener, Professor of Surgery at the University of Chicago.
Stockholm3 has been developed for population-based screening and validated both in Europe and in the US. The groundbreaking SEPTA study, published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology in 2024, was a validation of Stockholm3 in a multi-ethnic cohort. The study included over 2,000 men of different ethnic and racial backgrounds in the US and Canada, of whom more than 1,100 belonged to Asian, Black and Hispanic minorities. All underwent prostate biopsy in accordance with applicable local care routines.
The recently published follow-up study shows that Stockholm3 outperforms the ratio of free to total PSA, PSA density and modern risk calculators, including the European Randomized Study of Screening for Prostate Cancer-4 calculator, the Prostate Biopsy Collaborative Group calculator and the Prostate Cancer Prevention Trial version 2 calculator. Compared with clinically used thresholds for the ratio of free to total PSA, Stockholm3 can reduce the number of unnecessary biopsies by 44% with a sensitivity of 95%.
(1) Vigneswaran HT, Eklund M, Discacciati A, Nordström T, Hubbard RA, Perlis N, Abern MR, Moreira DM, Eggener S, Yonover P, Chow AK, Watts K, Liss MA, Thoreson GR, Abreu AL, Sonn GA, Palsdottir T, Plym A, Wiklund F, Grönberg H, Murphy AB; SEPTA STHLM3 Study Group. Stockholm3 in a Multiethnic Cohort for Prostate Cancer Detection (SEPTA): A Prospective Multicentered Trial. J Clin Oncol. 2024 Nov 10;42(32):3806-3816. doi: 10.1200/JCO.24.00152. Epub 2024 Jul 22. PMID: 39038251.
(2) Lazarovich A, Vigneswaran H, Palsdottir T, Eklund M, Discacciati A, Nordström T, Hubbard RA, Perlis N, Abern MR, Moreira DM, Yonover P, Chow AK, Watts K, Liss MA, Thoreson GR, Abreu AL, Sonn GA, Plym A, Wiklund F, Grönberg H, Murphy AB, Eggener S. A Comparison of Stockholm3, Serum Biomarkers, and Risk Calculators to Predict Prostate Cancer in a Racially and Ethnically Diverse Cohort: Evaluation of the Stockholm3 Multiethnic SEPTA Trial. J Urol. 2025 May;213(5):590-599. doi: 10.1097/JU.0000000000004437. Epub 2025 Apr 9. PMID: 40202133.
